


Hanami

by greygerbil



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-13
Updated: 2018-07-13
Packaged: 2019-06-09 20:48:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,993
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15275904
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/greygerbil/pseuds/greygerbil
Summary: Even though her brother has found his soulmate and prepares a wedding, Mari has never been motivated to go out there looking for her supposedly perfect match. However, destiny comes to her in the form of one of Victor's rink-mates, who isn't expecting to find fate waiting for him in the sleepy town of Hasetsu, either.





	Hanami

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Rodinia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rodinia/gifts).



> Thanks so much for requesting this pairing, I had lot of fun writing this.

“It’s nice to meet you.”

Mari grinned at Georgi Popovich’s earnest attempt at Japanese. It was grammatically correct, as you’d expect from a phrase you could pick out of any travel guide, but the accent was heavy and kind of adorable paired with his stern expression.

“Not bad. Can you do more than that?” she gave back.

“Ah... just a little?” Georgi said, obviously groping for even more remote chunks of Japanese now.

“But at least you understood that,” Mari answered, in English this time to release him. “Georgi Popovich, right?”

He nodded his head.

“Georgi is fine.”

“Mari,” she said. “Come with me.”

He gripped the handle of his wheeled suitcase and followed Mari, who turned around to leave the small Hasetsu train station. Yuuri was collecting a good chunk of the top of the male figure skating world in Hasetsu for his wedding to Victor. She’d been a fan for a long time, because of her brother at first and of course most importantly of him. She’d come to like the sport, though, and having all these attractive young men living with her family right now was pretty fun.

“You are Yuuri’s sister?” Georgi asked.

“The very one.”

“Thank you for picking me up.”

“No problem. Can’t have a lonely Russian trailing lost through Hasetsu.” She glanced at Georgi. “Why didn’t you come with the others from St. Petersburg?”

The lucky soulmates as well as Mila, Yuri, Yakov and Lilia had all arrived at the head of the throng four days earlier.

“I was in an ice show.”

“Oh, what did you do?”

They walked out of the station doors and across the street towards the parking lot to the sound of Georgi’s trolley on the uneven cobblestone. It was a warm evening for spring, with the sun still winking golden behind the rooftops.

“It was a Tchaikovsky feature organised by the Ministry for Culture.”

“They didn’t want Victor for that?”

Georgi looked like he was biting his tongue, wounded pride flickering in his eyes, which made her regret the question.

“I’m sure they asked him first,” he said, curtly.

He followed her silently past the sparse few cars to the back of the lot, but stopped before a cherry tree. The blossoms were in full bloom right now, clouds of soft pink on every street corner.

“Isn’t there a word in Japanese for looking at these trees?”

“ _Hanami_. The parties are pretty good,” Mari said as she unlocked her car and opened the trunk.

“Parties? I thought it was about contemplating beauty and the transience of life.”

“I can see why you and Victor are friends,” Mari said with a wry grin, remembering her brother-in-law-to-be’s heartfelt speech about why the date for the wedding to his soulmate had to be during cherry blossom season.

-

“Can I help you?”

Mari hoisted another ten kilo package of rice out of the back of her car and glanced over her shoulder. Georgi stood in the back door to the Yu-topia building in the moss green yukata he had been given for his stay. His hair was still damp.

“Nah, you’re a guest.”

“It was nice of your family to let us stay here, so I can at least pitch in.”

Mari shrugged as she walked past him through the open door that led into the storage room behind the kitchen.

“I mean, I won’t complain, but don’t let my mom see you or I’m getting into trouble for not being hospitable enough,” she said.

“If she sees me, I will drop whatever I’m holding,” Georgi promised before grabbing a crate of water bottles.

Work went a lot faster with two people and soon Georgi was sorting spices into the shelves at her orders while she stacked vegetables in the fridge.

“How are you liking Hasetsu?”

“It’s beautiful. Not so small that one feels lonely, but not crowded enough to make one nervous. I like the beach better than the one in St. Petersburg, too.”

Mari smiled to herself. That wouldn’t make a bad line on an ad. Maybe they should hire him alongside Victor to drive tourism back into town.

“Are you from St. Petersburg?”

“Not originally. I lived in Chelyabinsk until I was nine.”

“Never heard of that one.”

“It’s pretty big, but when people know it, it’s usually for the pollution and because of how many accidents the big nuclear plant had, and much waste they were dumping in the rivers,” Georgi admitted. “It’s one of the coldest cities in Russia, too, so it doesn’t get a ton of tourists.” Glancing out the window at the sky, he shook his head. “I don’t really understand why more people don’t come here, though. Yuuri said that’s been a problem. I find this place so inspiring.”

“No one is dying of radiation poisoning in Hasetsu, so I guess that _is_ a plus,” Mari answered. “It’s just not very exciting for younger people. Yu-topia is not a hotel, so our income can come from local guest. That’s probably why we survived.“ She slapped the fridge door shut. “Though I swear half the people I went to school with have moved to Tokyo at this point. At some point the town will be empty.”

“But you’ve always been here?”

“Someone had to take care of the onsen while Yuuri was skating around the world,” Mari said with a shrug and pulled a cigarette out of her pocket.

-

There was someone at the front door. Mari turned down the volume on her laptop down to make sure she hadn’t mistaken the sound, but she heard steps shuffling in the night-quiet house on the floor below and the whine of hinges.

Considering it was past one in the morning, no one should have been able to come in without a key, but it hadn’t sounded like the door had been forced open, either. Still, Mari was quiet as she inched down the stairs.

The hallway was already illuminated as she peeked down the staircase and saw Georgi, his shoes in hand. When he spotted her, he lifted his free hand.

“My apologies, did I wake you?” he asked, quietly.

“No, I was up. Were you out partying?”

She grinned as she moved back up the stairs so Georgi, who was in an upstairs room, too, could follow. Georgi shook his head.

“Out in the woods by the beach. Yuuri gave me a key so I could come in late,” he said, pulling it out of his pocket as evidence.

“In the woods? Now? Why?”

“Just to take in the atmosphere. It’s almost full moon.”

Mari snorted. By now, Georgi had helped her out around the house a few times and the way he talked about things like visiting the market or going to the beach like he’d been to an art gallery and had seen some magnificent pieces, it was not surprising that a poetic soul like him started wandering the forest at night to marvel at the stars.

“You are a weirdo,” she said. “Was it nice?”

“Very! You should do it sometimes.” He cocked his head. “Why are you still awake?”

“I helped my dad close up. Besides, I need to catch up on a show.”

“Is it that good?”

“It’s actually horrible,” Mari admitted, “but my favourite singer Takao is in it.”

“The one who looks like Yuri?”

“Oh, he remembered that,” Mari said, chuckling.

“He complained about it on the flight here,” Georgi said, smiling briefly. “Now I’m curious what Takao looks like.”

“I can show you.”

Mari waved him into her room and Georgi placed his shoes down at the threshold of her door before entering, his gaze briefly taking in the space. The posters on her walls were all idols and bands, framed in an attempt a few years back to make it look a little less like the person living here was still sixteen, but the big Takao poster was an older one where he hadn’t bleached his hair yet, so Mari thought that didn’t count as real proof for her association. Her bookcase was spilling over with sci-fi novels and old manga, and her desk looked about as orderly, Yu-topia’s bills that she handled strewn all over. An old Hello Kitty stuffy remained perched as the last survivor of her numerous childhood companions at the head of her bed.

“Your room feels a lot like a home. I like it.”

“I’ve had it for all my life, so it’d be a problem if it didn’t,” Mari said, clicking on the video. It had English fansubs, as that was the most easily available version she’d found on a streaming site, so it shouldn’t be a problem for Georgi.

“Takao should show up at the end of the episode, but I don’t want to watch it out of order. Sit down.”

She pointed at the couch next to her and Georgi did as he was told, gently nudging a packet of cigarettes out of the way before leaning forward to see the subtitles. Mari noticed now in her well-lit room that the wind had messed with his hair, which looked kind of funny because Georgi seemed to like preening and was usually put-together, on and off the ice, though his general sense of style was the debatable. She though the strict, angular hair-do did fit his him, but this look was a little more boyish. Come to think of it, he was younger than her, wasn’t he? Not that he’d still be skating at his level if he weren’t. It was just weird to realise she was older than pretty much all of Yuuri’s colleagues already.

Georgi laughed at something on the screen and Mari remembered she’d been meaning to watch that episode and not her guest. They sat together until the credits when Georgi turned to her.

“If it was the guy in the red shirt, he does look a bit like Yuri,” he said. “But what happens to him and his boyfriend. Are they getting back together?”

“I haven’t gotten further than this, either.” Mari reached across his lap to grab the cigarettes. “If you want to know, I’ll drop by when I’m finished with work tomorrow. We can watch the next episode.”

It would be nice not to be the only person in Hasetsu to have thoughts on this crappy show for once.

-

“Did you cry?” Mari asked with one eyebrow raised.

Mila, who was tagging along beside Georgi as they walked with the throng of wedding guests from the temple back to Yu-topia, grinned and poked Georgi in the ribs.

“All through the ceremony,” she announced gleefully.

“It was very moving,” Georgi said indignantly. His eyes were still a little red and his long dark lashes looked wet with tears.

Mila was distracted from an answer by Yuri shouting something in Russian that Mari didn’t understand and took off after him with a quick nod to Mari, leaving her and Georgi walking next to each other down the old, uneven road, which was covered in cherry blossom petals.

“I mean, you could barely make it through last night’s episode with dry eyes, so it’s no surprise,” Mari said, picking up the teasing where Mila had left off.

“Wouldn’t it be stranger not to be moved by a wedding or a piece of art?”

“I’m not sure that series can be called art.”

“You watched it before I did.”

“You got me there,” Mari murmured, habitually patting for pockets on the kimono she was wearing. She would’ve liked a cigarette, but of course there was nowhere to store them in a traditional outfit like this. Georgi followed the movement of her hands with his eyes.

“This looks very beautiful on you,” he said.

She would hope it did, after how long it had taken to get all the folds to fall right and have the tight belt seated around her waist in a way Minako found satisfactory, not to mention the effort it was to wrangle her hair into a form that allowed for ornamental flowers to be fastened to it.

“Thanks. How much does it show I don’t like wearing it?”

Georgi had to smile.

“Only a bit,” he admitted.

“It’s pretty and all, but I prefer my normal clothes.”

This just felt so stiff. Still, Victor had wanted the big traditional Japanese wedding and Yuuri was in love enough to go along with damn near everything his husband asked, and so Mari had bent the knee and put on something that’d look pretty on a family picture in twenty years.

“I guess it’s okay for a change,” she added as they ambled a few steps behind the small crowd. “Did you enjoy the ceremony?”

“Yes, it was great. I really liked the part where the priest drew their soulmate mark on a piece of parchment and hung it on a lantern at the temple.”

“That’s an old tradition. Sort of a good luck charm,” Mari explained with a nod. It had been a pretty drawing of the snowflake that had appeared on the back of their right hands when they had first touched, too, with thick, calligraphy-like brushstrokes.

“Victor looked very happy. He’s changed since he met Yuuri,” Georgi said, smiling softly.

“How long have you two known each other?”

“I joined Yakov’s team later than him, but we’ve been training together for eighteen or nineteen years now.”

That probably made Georgi as close to family as anything Victor still seemed to have, considering his addition to the closest relatives pool had been only his coach and his rink-mates.

Mari looked to the front, where Yuuri and Victor were leading the way with slow, measured steps. Yuuri had never seemed chronically unhappy to her, but it was clear that meeting his soulmate had brought out a side in him even he might not have known of before. She herself didn’t really believe in the power of love as more than a cute idea, and being bound to a soulmate was a vaguely frightening thought, but watching those two was enough to make you think there was something to it. If anyone deserved to get a fairy-tale romance, it was her little brother, anyway; but all big sisters probably thought that.

-

Georgi would leave in two days with his team and Yuuri, and while Mari would of course miss her brother most and also had a lot of affection for her eccentric brother-in-law, it occurred to her one evening that not having Georgi around anymore might actually make her miss him.

For one, Georgi helped her around the house. He also didn’t mind discussing that terrible show they watched together, or talking shop about figure skating and sharing his plentiful thoughts about performances that had touched him (he had way better industry gossip than Yuuri, who disappointingly never paid attention to that kind of thing, too). He always seemed happy to talk with her, even when she was just bitching about Yu-topia, and had even joined forces with her last week to kick out the same three drunks that always hung around past closing time every Friday.

The thought remained with her as she brought a leftover crate of watermelon soda from the wedding to Yuuko at the rink one evening, since this unbearably sweet stuff was her daughters’ favourite. Maybe because she’d dwelled on him she immediately recognised his dark coat on the wardrobe.

“Is Georgi in?” she asked, pointing at the door.

Yuuko nodded her head. “I’ll be packing up here, but you can talk to him, I still have some paperwork to do.”

“Thanks, see you around,” Mari said as she pushed the door to the rink open.

Though she liked Yuuko, she didn’t actually spend that much time here, so her strongest memories of the rink were still from when she was twelve or thirteen and used to pick Yuuri up after training five times a week. It helped that the place had basically not changed at all since then, except that there was now a Russian pro skater doing a combination spin on the ice. He slowed and gracefully arched his free leg downwards, still not noticing her as he passed by, his eyes looking at something far away with a melancholy expression on his face.

Mari let him do a quadruple Salchow and a few footwork elements before she clapped her hands. Georgi flinched and had to do a clumsy sideways step to prevent himself from toppling over. Mari snickered.

“You were miles away, huh?” she asked.

“That’s the way I skate,” Georgi said, almost proud, as he straightened again. “What are you doing here?”

“Just dropping something off for Yuuko,” she said with a shrug. “You looked pretty good doing that.”

“Thank you.”

The surprise on Georgi’s face seemed weird until she remembered that the first thing she’d done when they’d met was wonder out loud why anyone would pick Georgi over Victor for an ice show and – okay, she could see how he’d get the impression she had nothing to appreciate here.

“I like the way you skate,” she clarified. Georgi had been on TV almost as long as she remembered watching skating, so she’d had ample time to see he was a world-class athlete; it was just that Victor was always ahead of him. “I didn’t actually want to call you a bad skater when we met.”

Georgi studied her for face a moment, but then shook his head and smiled briefly.

“When I do something like that, most people’s first question is ‘why isn’t Victor Nikiforov here’? I’m used to it.”

“That’d piss me off.”

“I’m not going to choose another career where I compete with Victor again, that’s for sure,” Georgi said, with another twitch at the corner of his mouth.

“What _are_ you going to do when you’re done with skating, anyway?” she asked, pushing her hands into her jacket pockets.

“I don’t know yet,” Georgi admitted, with a sigh. “I have a few ideas. I’ve had to think about it before when I got injured, so it’s not new to me. You never know how many seasons you still have in you.” He lowered his gaze from the ceiling and looked at her again. “What about you?”

“Me?” Mari asked, surprised. “I’m not switching jobs. Keeping an onsen isn’t a pro sport you have to stop at thirty.”

“Did you ever want to do something else, though?”

“I told you, Yuuri’s had his career and someone needed to help my parents out. They’re not getting any younger. I don’t want the place to close down, either, so.” She shrugged. “That’s what I did and I guess that’s what I’ll keep doing.”

“It doesn’t sound like it’s your dream job,” Georgi said, frowning.

“I mean, it’s not, but I’m not a thirteen year old girl who wants to become an idol. That’s just how life works out sometimes.” She smiled. “Don’t look so worried. It’s not like I’ve got it bad here. I don’t know if I wanted your job, either, always wondering if I’d still be doing the same thing in a year’s time.”

Georgi nodded his head, even if he didn’t look entirely convinced. Maybe Mari wasn’t all that sure herself, either, but there wasn’t much to be done about it. They did seem to be on the same wave of cluelessness about the next fifty years of their life, anyway. Good to know she wasn’t the only one.

“Hey, can you skate some more? Since Yuuri moved to St. Petersburg, I haven’t gotten to watch many pro skaters live here,” Mari said, deciding to push the topic away for now.

Georgi did a little bow.

“Of course,” he said. “What would you like to see?”

“Just skate your favourite piece,” Mari said, leaning comfortably on the rink guard.

-

Later that evening, Georgi came to her room to watch the next episode of their show. Mari scooted over on her couch to make room for him as he slid the door shut so they wouldn’t disturb anyone trying to sleep. As he turned to the couch, however, his naked toes caught on a loose tatami mat and he stumbled forward.

It happened too fast for Mari to jump out of the way, so she found herself with a lap full off Russian skater seconds later.

“Sorry!” Georgi managed, quickly straightening. Mari grabbed his arm to help him up.

“No problem - _ouch_.”

“Did I hurt you?” Georgi asked, concern in his voice.

“No…”

Mari glanced briefly down at herself. There had been a sharp pain shooting up from her calf, but Georgi hadn’t even fallen onto that part of her. It was over as fast as it had appeared, anyway, so maybe she’d just shifted her leg weirdly under his weight.

“It’s fine. Let’s start the episode,” she said with a shrug.

-

It was only when Mari had put on the yukata she liked to wear to sleep that she noticed a black mark on the back of her left calf from the corner of her eyes. Twisting her leg, she peered down at it and after a moment of contemplating the artfully intertwined black lines, she recognised them as an ornamental drawing of a cherry blossom.

She reached down and rubbed at it. It moved with her skin just like a tattoo. She didn’t have any tattoos.

She stared five more seconds, maybe, before she realised that she was looking at a soulmate mark.

_What the fuck?_

Those only happened if you touched your soulmate, right? So who had she touched today that she hadn’t touched before?

She stumbled mentally through a list of guests she may have brushed when she served them when, with searing clarity, she remembered grabbing Georgi’s naked arm to get him off her lap.

Dropping her damp towel on her bed, Mari hurried out of her room and down the hallway, where Georgi’s room was. She tore the screen open without knocking on the frame.

Georgi sat on the futon with a battered copy of _Gone with the Wind_ in his hands. He looked up at her, startled.

“Mari?”

“Take off your pants,” Mari demanded.

Colour rushed to Georgi’s cheeks.

“What?”

She really didn’t want to waste time to explain herself right now and she realised that moment that his pants were soft gym clothes. Wordlessly, she dropped to her knees on the futon and pulled up the leg of the pants over his left calf, pushing it up to his knee.

The picture she found matched hers perfectly.

Mari let herself fall backwards with a deep exhale, looking at Georgi, her _soulmate_ , who was now also staring at his leg. Finally, the same switch that had clicked in her head seemed to flip. He raised his gaze to meet hers, smiling, and simultaneously looking like he was about to burst into tears.

Despite everything, Mari had to laugh. It sounded a bit shaky.

“Oh, come on. It’s not that bad.”

“No, of course it’s not! That’s not what I…”

Whatever parts of English or Japanese he could call on to communicate with her seemed to fail Georgi, then. He pulled her against his chest and Mari put her arms around his waist. No, it actually wasn’t that bad, even if her heart was still convinced she was running a marathon judging by how it hammered. It was a whole lot less troublesome than she’d expected running into her soulmate to be.

When Yuuri and Victor found them, having come upstairs to see what all the noise was about, Georgi was still holding on to her like he didn’t plan on letting her go again any time maybe this month, and Mari gave them a grin and a wave over her shoulder.

“What?” she asked her brother staring at her with his mouth open. “You’re the only one who is allowed to have a hot Russian skater boyfriend?”


End file.
